Quote:
Originally Posted by aegap
but wouldn't Mundo "Moll" be way more than just a mall?
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Its suppose to be something like Malecon Center. However, its suppose to consist of four glass towers. Two are suppose to be luxury residential, one a hotel and another one an office building. All four towers are connected by the three-story mall at the base which is suppose to have a large skating ring and the usual mall stuff (multi-screen movie theater, anchor stores, etc).
My personal feelings towards this proyect are the following:
The mall section: its pure speculation. The skating ring feature is a testament to that. The developers want this place to be a unique and important attraction to the city's moneyed classes. If they achieve their goal of attracting enough moneyed people and Mundo Mall becomes one of the center of middle class/upper class social life, then the mall concept could do well. Remember, where ever the moneyed classes go to play, if there is space, the businesses follow them and that is the concept behind the mall feature.
The residential towers: luxury apartments are selling like hot bread in Santo Domingo right now. The Dominican real estate market is not necessarily extremely active and fast paced, but the luxury apartment segment is doing well. Proof of that are the many luxury towers which are being almost sold out, often without even breaking ground! There is a greater chance the residential towers could be a success.
The office tower: I'm not too familiar with the office space market in Santo Domingo, so I can't really comment on this. However, the fact that the Intercentro office tower (the glass tower in Naco that was suppose to be the headquarters for Baninter) has not rented an inch of office space. I am almost sure it has to do with goverment limbo because the Citibank tower (aka, Acrópolis) is doing relatively well with its office space rentals. Again, I'm not too familiar with this market segment in SDQ.
The hotel: it could work, but I do have some doubts. The only reason I have doubts is because this luxury hotel will be competing with the other luxury high rise hotels, most of them lining the Caribbean sea on the Malecon. When visitors have an option of paying money for staying at a luxury hotel and the price difference between seafront and middle of the city is not that great, common sense says people will choose the seaside hotel and opt for a room with sea views. Unless the Santo Domingo Hotel Association promotes the city through the support of various concerts, conventions, etc in the city, I have my doubts of the success of such luxury hotel in such place in the city. However, if the mall section and the office tower does well, perhaps the hotel itself will gain an advantage over the other luxury hotels.
Despite that, the luxury hotels along the Malecon have a tremendous advantage. For example, the Hilton SDQ has the advantage of being within the Malecon Center mall complex and the other hotels in the area are within walking distance of each other, thus visitors can hotel hop for the best amenities if they wish. I'm not sure that will work with whatever hotel locates itself at MundoMall.
This project has its strong and weak points, but overall I think it will be a hard sell.
Look at the bright side, if it is built, it certainly will look better than the gigantic hole that exist there!
-NALs
